Trebuchet
by KriegDiadem
Summary: The devastated Sailor Team must find the strength to fight again when a new enemy arrives. Sequel to Counterweights.
1. A Narrow Cage

The _Counterweights_ story so far:

The death of a salaryman in a Senshi-caused accident triggers a chain of events that lead up to the Sailor Soldiers fighting for their lives against two aliens bent on conquering the planet. Tokyo is laid waste as Sailors Jupiter, Uranus, Neptune, and Venus are killed and Sailors Saturn and Pluto are trapped. In a desperate last stand, Princess Serenity, Prince Endymion, Ami and Rei defeat the enemy.

Now the four must deal with the aftermath: the Salior Team decimated, their identities exposed, and Ami and Rei de-powered.

Meanwhile, Usagi, Rei, and Mamoru have come to a compromise agreement on their relationship, just as visions of a new enemy begin to plague Rei…

The saga continues in the sequel to _Counterweights_

Presented by KriegDiadem

**TREBUCHET**

Readers of _Counterweights_ will know to expect: coarse language, implicit sex, explicit violence, endless tears, increasingly long chapters, and flashbacks.

**CHAPTER I - A Narrow Cage  
**

_Several months after the end of the Terran-Massalian War_

Blood.

Blood on the floors, blood on the walls. She felt a drop of something warm and viscous land on her head and couldn't stop herself from looking up. Blood on the ceiling.

Metal slid against concrete. She didn't need to glance back to know that the chains approached. She ran but collapsed to her hands and knees after a few steps. She clutched her stomach, trying to stop the blood seeping from the gashes laid bare by the jagged cuts in the white cloth of her bodice. The chains reached her, looped around her ankles and slid upward, circling her legs, another set of chains clutching her wrists, the cold metal aggravating the many cuts and bruises on her skin. She dug her fingertips into the concrete, fighting against the pull, uselessly, the rough floor scraping her palms and knees as she struggled to free herself, struggled to get away from that crazed laughter behind her…

"Ah."

A dark bedroom welcomed Rei. A nightmare, then. A vision, rather. She sat up, ran her hands through her hair and grimaced at the sweat she felt gathered at the back of her neck.

Why?, she asked the universe. She received no response.

Her visions had been vague at first, impressions of violence and Senshi power mixing into a disturbing sensation. They solidified as more time passed, the color red turning to blood, the violence turning into pain, the screams turning into that laughter that followed her even during the daytime.

She looked at the empty side of the bed and scowled before sliding back under the sheets, wrapping them around her, and falling into fitful slumber once again.

* * *

Usagi had only recently come to understand the concept of 'alone time'. Yes, she had grasped the concept, abstractly. She had observed Mamoru, Rei, and Ami almost viciously protect their right to solitude. But never had she truly understood the need for it, nor did she think she would ever require it.

Until now.

When she had one significant other plus a child, she lacked time for anything else. With two significant others, her already minimal spare time vanished.

She glanced at the man sleeping next to her. Mamoru's breathing had become deep and rhythmic as he slipped into sleep. His stomach rose and fell and Usagi watched his relaxed face for a moment before she carefully removed herself from the bed. She pulled on a dark blue hoodie and sweatpants and silently climbed out the open window. They were on the second floor, it was a bit of a drop, but she managed to land without breaking anything. It was very late on Saturday – or very early on Sunday – and the streets were empty, relatively, anyway.

She reached her destination without being noticed. Here she was, at the place where Jupiter, Uranus, and Neptune had died, the place where Venus had stabbed them with the sword she held in her hands now. The city had built a memorial here, a sculpture of the three of them, lightning surrounding Jupiter, an ocean wave rising behind Neptune, earth splitting under Uranus's feet. It was beautiful, it must have been impossibly difficult to create, it was wrong.

She stared at the sculpture for a long time.

Earlier that day she had made a mistake. She thought she was ready. She had opened up one of the few photo albums that had survived the destruction of the Tsukino house, photo albums that captured the days of their shining youth, photo albums that had girls dressed in high school uniforms and girls who still had baby fat on their cheeks and girls who were alive. She had been forced to stop after the first two pages, her vision blurred by tears. She had shaken off her parents' concerns, had avoided her friends and lovers, had locked herself into the bathroom and had stared at the white ceiling for hours, wracked by grief and guilt.

Why hadn't it worked?

Neither her tears in the moment they had died, nor her heart crying out for them over the months that followed, nor her sheer willpower combined with attempts to use the Ginzuishou, had brought them back to life, back to where they belonged. They shouldn't have died. It wasn't their time. It couldn't be their time. Right? She would have asked, she would have checked with Pluto, except…

Her hands tightened around the hilt of the sword. It must be her lack of discipline. That was what Rei and Ami always said about her, that she lacked discipline, and she knew they were right, she was not too proud to admit it was one of her many, many flaws. She wasn't focused enough, she couldn't bring specific people back to life if she couldn't even focus.

So she had asked them. She had asked Mamoru and Rei and Ami and even Shingo where they got their laser focus from. Mamoru, Rei, and Shingo had all gotten too suspicious, too quickly, but Ami had been ecstatic to show her. In the end, her method came down to:

Stay still

And

Concentrate.

Two more things Usagi did not excel at, but she would not let her personal failures obstruct the path back to life for Neptune, Uranus, Jupiter and Venus. She laid the sword in front of the sculpture and grasped her Eternal Moon Article. Moments later she had transformed into Sailor Moon. She clutched her brooch more tightly as she fell to her knees and concentrated on her memories of her friends.

Something began to swell within her and she realized that she was glowing.

She thought of Makoto's rose earrings, of the glint in Haruka's eyes after she won a race, of the bright sounds of the high notes from Michiru's violin, of her own voice mingled with Minako's as they spoke the same words, their minds working in unison.

The glow grew brighter as she fell to her knees and let her tears drop onto the pavement below her. She could do it. She could bring them back. She could almost hear their laughter and see their bright smiles already. _Watch out, Usagi-chan. You'll get eaten by the wolf, koneko-chan. Ara, ara… We'll always be together!_

Black spots encroached on her vision. The ground began to spin.

As she fell to the ground she heard someone call her name, a name she had not heard in a while –

"Usako!"

* * *

The name spilled from his lips before he could stop it. Usako, he had called out, as his heart leapt in his throat when he saw her fall to the ground, when he saw the glow that surrounded her dim to nothing. He sprinted toward her and managed to catch her just in time. He hoped he had prevented a painful collision but it would have hardly mattered. The sailor fuku disappeared and left an unconscious Usagi in his arms.

"Usako!" He shook her, trying to wake her.

The sound of nearby footsteps made him look up. Rei and Ami were rushing toward him. Ami looked worried, Rei looked furious.

Mamoru cringed slightly. It was not the first time Usagi had attempted this, and he had no doubt it would not be the last – and he and Rei had made a pact with each other, to always keep track of where she was, to make sure she never had the opportunity to risk her life like this. And he had failed so utterly, had somehow managed to sleep through her escape from the house.

He ducked as Rei and Ami came to a stop before him but to his surprise Rei did not immediately tear him to pieces. Instead she turned toward Ami.

"This is your fault," she hissed, her voice barely controlled. "When she asked you to learn how to focus, what did you think she was going to do? Learn calculus?"

Ami's eyes widened with surprise, for a moment, before an apathetic mask covered the expression. "Perhaps," she said, her tone light. "I thought she might finally edify her mind. How could I foresee that you, of all people, would be such a poor guardian?"

Rei looked stricken for a split second before her eyes narrowed and her frame began to shake with rage. Ami looked back coolly.

"I suppose," Ami continued, "That I made a mistake, too, in trusting anyone but myself to protect the princess. I could at least do the job semi-competently."

Alarm bells rang through Mamoru's mind. He carefully laid Usagi on the ground. He jumped up to place himself between Ami and Rei just in time as Rei took a step forward, fists raised.

"Hey, what's going on?" he said. "What's wrong with you two? If anyone is to blame here, it's me." And Usagi, he thought, but he dared not say so at the moment. "I've never seen you two behave like this."

Rei immediately dropped her fighting stance.

"What are you talking about?" she asked. "It was just a heated discussion. We have those all the time, Ami and I. Right, Ami-chan?"

"Certainly," Ami replied, sidestepping Mamoru to kneel down next to Usagi and check her pulse. "We are often philosophically opposed."

Mamoru looked uneasy.

"I don't know…"

"Trust us, Mamo-chan," Rei said, her voice dripping with sweetness. Mamoru stiffened at the nickname. Rei smiled. "Anyway, since you found Usagi, you can carry her home."

* * *

Ami and Rei followed a few meters behind Mamoru, who had Usagi in a bridal carry.

Rei was glaring at the back of his head. Ami nudged her.

"What was that?" Ami asked.

"What was what?" Rei replied, tearing her eyes away from Mamoru to glance at her companion.

"Two things, really. First…our 'discussion'."

Rei could hear the air quotes quite well in Ami's voice. Their argument could hardly be classified as such. At best it had been an argument. More accurately, it had been a fight. They had come very close to exchanging blows, and Rei wasn't quite so confident that she would have won, if the way Ami had been eyeing her larynx was any indication.

"I'm sorry," she said. "I don't know what came over me. I guess I was just…mad."

"I'm sorry, too." Ami sighed. "I felt very defensive."

"I hadn't noticed," Rei said drily. "Let's just forget about it. It's pretty understandable, since our princess just brought herself to the brink of death again. What's that second thing you wanted to ask about?"

Ami smiled. "Mamo-chan?"

Rei frowned. "It's not fair." She could hear the whininess in her own voice, but pressed on anyway. "He shouldn't be allowed to call her 'Usako'. He hasn't since they divorced."

Ami pondered this for a moment before she shrugged.

"I'm sorry, Rei-chan, I'm not understanding why it wouldn't be fair."

"Because!" Rei looked up at the sky, struggling to verbalize the injustice of it all. "Because it's such a cute nickname. It brings back tons of history, instantly."

Ami stared at her, somewhat surprised. "Rei-chan…you and Usagi also have a lot of history, too."

"But he met her first." She looked forward again and continued to scowl at the back of Mamoru's head. Mamoru seemed to sense this. He glanced back for a moment, eyebrow raised. Rei plastered on a smile. He shrugged and turned back.

"You're being ridiculous," Ami said.

Rei slumped her shoulders. "I know."

* * *

_Several months later_

She fell to her hands and knees, utterly breathless, as if she had just run a hundred flights of stairs. She tried to crawl away, tried to escape the heavy metal chains, even as they dragged her backwards, tried to pull them off, but they only squeezed her more tightly still, cutting off her breathing entirely –

And when she woke up she swallowed her first instinct to berate Usagi for having tangled the sheets. Instead she let out a vaguely irritated sigh and extricated herself from her cotton prison.

"Good morning," Usagi mumbled. Rei glanced over to the other side of the bed and smiled as she watched Usagi blearily roll over to face her.

"Good morning," she said, the nightmare vision already slipping away as she moved closer to the other woman. "You have got some crazy bed hair going on."

Usagi scowled and glared at Rei's silky locks that draped neatly over her shoulders. She sat up and pulled Rei closer, twirling the ends of her hair around her fingers. "So what's wrong?"

"That dream again," she said. She wished that half their mornings didn't start with the bloody tales of her nightmares. "The chains." Unconsciously she rubbed at her knees, a movement not missed by Usagi.

"Did it hurt?"

"A little bit." Rei tried to make her tone as dismissive as possible, but there was no deceiving Usagi with that kind of line any more.

"Where?"

"My knees, especially," Rei said, and she raised her eyebrows in surprise as Usagi slid down and laid a kiss against them. "And my hands." She smiled as she felt delicate lips against her palms. "And my lips." At this Usagi shot her an amused look but she chose to indulge her, drawing back only when the alarm clock on the night table began to beep. She slammed the snooze button and pulled away.

"I would tell you to be careful," Usagi said, "But I know that's pretty much useless. So I'm not going to leave your side today."

"But you have to do that ribbon-cutting at the new city hall."

"I'll cancel it."

Rei leaned back against the headboard and tapped her fingers against the mattress. Not that she was opposed to spending the day with Usagi, but Usagi would be trying to protect her – and that was not how it was supposed to go. This past year had been so frustrating, without Mars to call upon, and now it had finally come to this. She could not allow it.

"Mamoru can come with me instead. I don't think he has any scheduled events today."

Usagi looked scandalized. "No way! The tabloids already think you're a couple."

Rei smiled and flipped her hair over her shoulders. "Well, we do look good together. Raven hair, crystalline eyes, stunningly gorgeous – "

"No," Usagi said. "You look good individually. You do not look good together."

"Don't be jealous," Rei teased.

Usagi smiled slyly. "I wouldn't mind, you know."

Rei looked appalled. "Ugh, no, I was just kidding. Anyway, I don't care what the tabloids think. That picture where we look like we're standing really close together was just – "

"…What picture?" Usagi asked.

"Um, no picture. You know what, forget tabloids, and pictures," and especially him, she thought. She slipped off the bed and slowly shed the shorts and tank top that served as her pajamas. She walked toward Usagi, clasped her hands, and set them on her hips, skimming the band of her underwear. "Let's forget everything, for at least a little while." She pulled her backward, until they had crossed the threshold into the adjoining bathroom.

* * *

Mamoru drove toward the building that housed the Timewarp Semisphere.

He had spent much of the past year pouring over physics books, trying to re-learn everything he had forgotten after he had switched tracks from pure science to medical school. With Ami's help it had been easy to get to the point he had reached before, and to surpass it, even, but now he was stuck. Every time he found something he thought might help, he reached a dead end. Every incursion into original research he did turned up nothing, though he had gotten a few good papers out of it.

But time did not make sense. Time was already a slippery enough concept in traditional physics. Time, as manipulated by both Setsuna and their enemies, seemed incomprehensible. Maybe it was not meant to be understood. It was magic, after all.

In his mind he could hear Ami scoffing.

"Magic is simply sufficiently advanced technology," she said, shamelessly stealing from Arthur C. Clarke. "Except for the Ginzuishou," she'd always faithfully add. "That is true magic."

But Usagi's attempts to use the Ginzuishou to free Setsuna and Hotaru without also freeing Accra had always failed. That was one of their problems. Mamoru was almost sure he could break the sphere open, but Accra was immortal. They could not defeat her so easily.

And their other problem – if they broke it open, what kind of state would Pluto and Saturn be in? Their constantly fluctuating ages meant they could be freed at a most undesirable moment – like as fetuses, or as old women with little life left.

He parked the building and grabbed ChibiUsa from her baby car seat. Here was another aspect of his life where time's flow confused him. ChibiUsa was growing at a very slow rate. They hid her from the media partially because it seemed wrong to expose an infant to the press – but mostly because they would ask too many questions. She could walk and run by herself and she knew a few crucial words like –

"Candy!"

Mamoru shook his head.

"No candy."

Her lower lip wobbled. He stuck his tongue out and crossed his eyes and this was enough to distract her from thoughts of delicious sweets.

Though it reminded her of something else.

"Mama?"

"Mama is not here," he said. "Mama is working."

She stayed quiet for a few minutes, until they reached the building and he set her down in the playpen. Whenever she was here she seemed less interested in the toys scattered about than the sight of the glowing Semisphere and Pluto, Saturn, and Accra stuck within it. And the sight of Saturn always reminded her of –

"Rei-mama?"

"Not here," he said again. "Rei-mama is working."

And then always, no Mama and no Rei-mama was too much to handle, and the tears would start.

"Don't cry, sweetie! Daddy's here. Look what Daddy can do!" In a flash he had transformed into Tuxedo Mask, and all thoughts of mothers were forgotten as ChibiUsa clapped her hands excitedly.

"Tusk!"

"Tux."

"Tusk!"

Well, someday she would get it. He dropped a stuffed Tuxedo Mask toy into the playpen and waited until ChibiUsa seemed distracted enough that he could turn to his work. He skimmed one particular report on his desk that one of the team's scientists had prepared concerning the experiment they would conduct today.

Their plan seemed simple. They would use a magic-powered laser that could pass through the Semisphere. The laser carried nano-biomarkers, that it would implant into Saturn and Pluto. They would then build an energy dome around the Semisphere, a dome that only lifeforms with specific biological markers could pass through. When they destroyed the Semisphere, Pluto and Saturn could escape, leaving Accra hopefully trapped in the second energy dome.

It was a dangerous plan, it was unlikely to work –

But they had to try.

"Professor Boucher," he called out, as the woman passed by his desk.

"Yes, Chiba-sensei?"

"Is the equipment set up yet?"

She nodded. "We're ready to go as soon as you are. Do you want to call Sailor Moon?"

He was about to answer in the affirmative, but thought twice when he remembered what Usagi had relayed to him about the danger Rei was in.

"I think I can do it on my own power." He cast another glance at ChibiUsa, safely in her playpen behind a protective wall, then moved toward the machinery. "Here we go." He placed his hands on the laser's controls, closed his eyes, and focused on moving his energy into the machine. He felt his power flow and the machine rumbled and buzzed as it charged up. He opened his eyes, aimed the barrel of the machine at Pluto, and fired.

The laser hit its target and the sphere shook and glowed brighter as Tuxedo Mask kept the energy focused for ten seconds, thirty seconds, one minute…

And nothing else happened.

He stopped the flow of power and waited for Professor Boucher to turn the machine off before he dropped the controls.

"More power, do you think?" he asked, though he already knew the answer. Professor Boucher shook her head.

"I'm sorry. I don't think that's the issue." She sighed. "I guess it's back to the drawing board."

Tuxedo Mask grimaced and was about to comment further when he felt the ground begin to shake. The Semisphere had changed to a lighter shade and was letting out energy flares that appeared to be causing a small earthquake. Tuxedo Mask slammed the button on his communicator that linked him directly to Usagi, Ami, and Rei.

"Emergency at the Semisphere, assistance required immediately!"

* * *

Rei faced the joint of a wooden frame. She took a few deep breaths and let the sounds of her surroundings wash over her. The crackling of jackhammers against cement. The click of the camera shutters. Usagi's breathing.

"You're breathing too loudly," Rei said.

Usagi's attempts to remain stoic failed utterly. She laughed long and hard before she caught her breath again enough to say: "You can do it, Rei. I believe in you."

Rei grit her teeth and once again placed a nail against the wooden board. "Why don't you help instead of just standing there?"

"I'd get calluses," Usagi said. Rei rolled her eyes and swung the hammer back. "Pretty sure you don't want callused fingers in you."

"Shit!" Rei hissed, as the hammer struck her thumb painfully, before glancing the metal nail, sending it to the ground to join the dozens of others that she had failed to get into the board. The camera shutters clicked frantically. She felt her face heat up as she thought of the "clever" captions the press would come up with.

The press! If Rei had her way they would all live in a mountaintop cabin at least a few hours away from Tokyo. They would have retreated from the public eye and would have lived like hermits up there, to return to Tokyo only when the next planetary threat inevitably arrived.

But then the politicians and bureaucrats met them, and Rei and Ami remembered Minako's bequest, and they quickly hashed out a plan to help fix Tokyo. It should have been enough. They should have retreated to privacy in peace. But the devastation they saw on the news and the photographs in magazines compelled them to return. The rubble everywhere, the polluted waterways, the cracked pavement and downed wires and shattered glass and – the city was in shambles. When they returned to Tokyo they volunteered to help with manual labour, to clear the roadways, mostly.

Then they got swept up, Rei kicking and screaming back into construction and development, Ami with public health initiatives. Usagi was always in demand, and Rei thanked the kami for small mercies as the majority of public appearances fell upon her. Somehow Mamoru, the most flamboyant of them all, had managed to lay low, though he did have his share of fans, particularly women, if the number of lacy panties that arrived in their mail was any indication.

"Damn it, Usagi," Rei said, grabbing another nail from the toolbox. "Don't distract me."

"Sorry," she replied, but the ends of her lips curved upwards into a smile that telegraphed "not at all sorry".

As Rei lined another nail up, Usagi leaned against her shoulder and glanced upwards at the hardhat perched atop her head.

"I never knew these hardhats looked so cute on you," she commented.

Rei had to smile at that. "You should have told me they were your thing long ago. I had like twenty back in the day."

"I'm going to steal one," Usagi said.

"Oh?" Rei vaguely asked. She had once again lost the thread of the conversation, to focus on her target. "What about the coppertoed boots and the overalls?"

"Maybe you'll come home and find me all dressed up and ready for a day on site," Usagi suggested, her voice suddenly airy. "Or maybe you'll come home and find me wearing the hardhat and nothing else at all."

"Fuck!" Rei hissed as she once again struck her thumb with the nail. She whirled around. "Usagi…"

"Rei-chan," Usagi interrupted, her voice dripping with disappointment, "I thought you were supposed to have good aim."

"Shut up! Why do you always have to – "

EVIL INTENT

Rei lightly pushed Usagi away, stepped backward, and flung the hammer. The tip of the handle left her hands just as a beam of energy smashed into the wooden frame next to her. The hammer flew end over end and disappeared over the top of a nearby building.

She took a few more steps back as the beam congealed into a type of gel.

"Gross," she said.

"Rei! Are you alright?"

Rei barely caught Usagi in time as she jumped into her arms, nearly knocking Rei over.

"Yeah…" She stared at the gel thing again. "But I'm a little disturbed."

Usagi glanced over her shoulder and crinkled her nose. "What _is_ that?"

Rei cleared her throat and loudly said: "I have no idea, but I'm sure one of the CSI techs will give us a sample for Ami to look at."

The nearest cop looked toward her and nodded.

"Certainly ma'am." He moved toward the CSI van, recently arrived, just as another officer approached them.

"Sailor Mars," he said, "We've found the man who attempted to…" he glanced at the gel uncertainly. "…shoot you? We haven't identified him yet but we will certainly soon. I'm sorry to have to inform you that he was found dead. The hammer struck him in the face and killed him instantly."

Usagi looked ill. Rei said nothing. She felt guilt-free. It had been a clear case of self-defense after all, her reaction instinctual.

"We won't be charging you with anything," he continued.

She nodded. "Thank you, officer."

As the officer stepped away Usagi tangled her fingers between Rei's and looked at her with concern.

"Rei, that man…"

Rei remained silent for a moment, before she finally looked away. "I hope he didn't have any children," she said.

Whatever Usagi was going to say in response to that was interrupted when a technician arrived and handed them a phial filled with the gel. It was translucent aquamarine and seemed to glow very slightly. Rei wondered if it was even safe to be holding this, but her thoughts were derailed when her communicator crackled to life.

"Emergency at the Semisphere, assistance immediately required!"

* * *

He clenched his staff tightly and moved to stand in front of ChibiUsa's playpen. The ground continued to shake as the energy flares from the Semisphere grew larger and glowed brighter. He grit his teeth and cursed himself. He was an idiot, to think it was worth the risk, to send a laser through the Sphere. He had to do something to stabilize it, but what? He had to strengthen it. Magical energy, he'd need it, more than he had, he hoped Sailor Moon would get here soon.

She, Ami and Rei burst on the scene a second later. Sailor Moon stepped backward as a flare shot toward her, missing her by less than an inch.

"Sailor Moon!" Tuxedo Mask called out, hoping she could hear him all the way from the other end of the structure. "Heal the Sphere!"

Sailor Moon nodded. It was a strange idea but probably the best one they had.

"Starlight Honeymoon Therapy Kiss!"

Pink light shot from the Tiare and enveloped the Sphere. The flares shrank in size and brightness until the Sphere had returned to its quiet state. Sailor Moon dropped the attack and stared at the Sphere incredulously, for a moment, before she turned her attention back to Tuxedo Mask and ChibiUsa. She ran to the other side of the room and scooped her child up from the playpen.

"What happened?" she demanded.

"The Sphere destabilized." She glared at him. "I tried something and it didn't work."

Sailor Moon de-transformed and as Usagi she smacked him in the arm.

"Mamoru! You are not allowed to bring ChibiUsa to work ever again."

"Then who's going to look after her?"

"Me! Or Mom or Dad, they have eight million cops surrounding their house all the time anyways."

"But – "

"Or Ami. Or Naru and Umino. Or Motoki and Reika. Or Unazuki and Hikari. Or anyone else!"

"What about me?" Rei demanded. She and Ami had now joined them, having stopped for a moment to examine the Sphere. "I can watch her."

"You know I'd never doubt you," Usagi said, "But after what happened today…"

"I didn't get hurt. I'd never let ChibiUsa get hurt, either."

"Wait, what happened today?" Mamoru and Ami simultaneously asked. They exchanged a glance when Rei and Usagi remained silent, pulling out their smartphones instead. The headline on the landing page of the _Asahi Shimbun_ read:

ASSASSINATION ATTEMPT ON SAILORS MOON AND MARS THWARTED

The two looked horrified. Rei quickly stepped in to dispel their fears.

"It wasn't an assassination attempt," she said. "I think it was a kidnapping attempt."

"Besides," Usagi added, "They didn't try to kidnap both of us. Just her. I just happened to be standing nearby."

"That doesn't make me feel much better," Ami said. "Could it be a new enemy?"

"No," Usagi said.

"I hope not," Mamoru said.

"It definitely is," Rei said.

Ami sighed. She had been through this experience too many times and knew exactly who to trust with such pronouncements. She could already feel the exhaustion settle into her bones as she thought of the next long battle ahead of them.

"Do you think it's connected to those earlier visions you had?" she asked.

"With the chains and the blood?" Rei felt a little sick, and allowed a moment of self-pity. "I think so."

* * *

Ami placed a sample of the gel in the centrifuge and set it spinning. She placed her elbows on the table and let her chin rest in her hands as she watched the components split apart into three layers, a spectrum of viscous dark blue, green beads, and clear liquid. She separated them into different phials, and these she placed into the magical spectrometer, part of the array of magical technology Luna and Artemis had mysteriously managed to provide her over her tenure as a Sailor Senshi.

She waited until the analysis had run. The clear liquid was two parts hydrogen, one part oxygen, distilled water. The dark blue gel she had seen before from a youma's attack, a substance meant to capture people. Definitely a kidnapping attempt, then.

The green beads, however…

She stared at the readout. Its chemical composition, its electromagnetic wavelength, its magical signature. None of it made any sense to her. She thought maybe if she stared at it long enough, maybe if she thought about it long enough, she would learn what the purpose of the beads were, and how they had turned into solids from the liquid mixture, like mercury when spilled. She stared at the symbols on the paper until her eyes began to tire.

She leaned back, squeezed her eyes shut, and thought of all the problems she had to deal with, not even counting the ones from work. She thought of the destabilized Semisphere, of the gel in the machine before her, of the new enemy, of the growing tension in the household, of Urawa's parents and how they disapproved of her dangerous lifestyle – not a label Ami had thought she would ever hear applied to her – and of that other problem that she would nip in the bud before it could grow into a real trial.

She decided to address it immediately. She almost had all the facts. She was just missing confirmation. She locked the door to the basement, where she had built her lab, and drove to her next destination.

That other problem was a new religion centred around them.

There had been many of those, directly after the war, at least one per Senshi, and Ami was too aware that the most popular of these among schoolchildren was the one dedicated to Sailor Mercury. They would pray to statues of her for success in their schoolwork, no matter how many PSA's she'd narrate about the wonders of hard work and studying. There were also more general entities that had blended with the world's major religions. A whole slew of them had borrowed heavily from Shinto, mostly, she assumed, because the only truly religious one among them was Rei.

These were harmless. These sects were not fanatics bent on ridding them from this Earth, as the Followers had been, nor were their goals malicious in any way. No, mostly, they were filled with people who wanted to follow the paths of their heroes and hoped to find comfort and enlightenment.

But then there was this one.

She glanced at the banner as she walked up the steps to the large and ornate temple. It read:

DEDICATED TO OUR SAVIOURS THE SAILOR SENSHI

Not an uncommon inscription, but one that disturbed her, because it was under this banner that the true fanatics gathered.

Still, at least, these fanatics were more harmful to themselves than to the rest of the population. A hush fell in the entrance hall as she stood under the archway of the temple doors. The worshippers were on their knees, prostrate before statues of the Sailor Senshi. She stepped inside and listened to the resounding clang of the iron doors shutting behind her. The people inside began to rise to their feet. She noticed how many were clustered around the statues of their dead sisters-in-arms. A golden chain was wrapped around Venus's waist. A fountain spilled water at Neptune's feet. Plants grew from a plot of soil at Jupiter's feet.

These were all fine. These she had seen at other temples dedicated to them.

But then there was the dedication at Uranus's feet. They had, somehow, managed to create a miniature hurricane and had contained it in a box at her feet. Inside were bits of earth that showed the power of the windstorm inside the box. The rocks and dirt hurled back and forth, blown about every which way.

This was what had caught her attention.

How had they managed to make a mini perpetual hurricane? Science, she hoped. Magic, she dreaded. And even worse – how had they managed to see what so many people had missed?

For so many people had seen the destruction Uranus had wrought on the city. They had seen the fallen buildings, the smashed pavement, and the cracks in the earth. But few people had realized that the uprooted trees had been caused by her windstorms. The wind was as much a part of her as earth, was under her command, probably she felt even more attuned to it as she flew on Hermes' wings during track meets and felt the sea breeze against her when she drove her convertible at unlikely speeds next to the ocean.

This had first snagged her suspicion. Perhaps, she thought, it was just a very dedicated fan of Sailor Uranus who had noticed this. Or, perhaps, it was someone close enough to them that they would catch these details.

Careful months of investigation had led her to conclude that it was likely the latter.

She smiled at the acolyte who approached to greet her. "May I speak with your leader?"

"Of course, Mercury-sama. I will fetch Nobu-sensei right away."

She shook her head. "Thank you for the offer, but I would like to speak to your real leader."

His frozen smile would be enough evidence for an intuitive person like Minako or Rei, she supposed, and just this once she'd let it be enough for her. She closed her eyes and sighed.

"I know who she is," Ami said. "If she won't grant me an audience now, I will find her myself."

* * *

Something shook her awake.

She had been asleep, all this time, and now that she was conscious again, she thought this was the strangest she had ever felt.

Her mind was awake. Her body was not.

The tendrils of her consciousness floated outward. She thought she felt energy similar to Hotaru's.

"Hotaru," her mind called out. No one answered.

"Hotaru-chan," she tried again.

"Sailor Pluto?"

Who was that? Who had spoken? She felt the energy that spoke to her, thought it felt unfamiliar and tinged with evil. She retracted away from it sharply. It followed.

"Sailor Pluto?"

She remembered. She remembered that she was not just Setsuna but also Sailor Pluto, the Guardian of Time. She remembered that she had fought against evil forces time and again. She remembered that most recently, she and Sailor Saturn had trapped themselves and Accra in an infinite timeloop.

"Accra." She tried to hide the disdain she felt for the alien, but it projected into their shared plane of consciousness.

"Ah, Sailor Pluto." Accra made no attempt to hide the amusement she felt in response to Setsuna's disdain. What did she care, what Sailor Pluto thought of her? "It feels like a long time has passed since you trapped me in here. Has it?" She wished, though, that she could have hidden the fear, the fear of being trapped her forever, the fear of being trapped here and conscious forever.

"Perhaps," Setsuna replied. Again, she tried to hide her true feelings, tried to project confidence, but her uncertainty and confusion was clear. "Do you know what has awoken us?"

"No. Where is Sailor Saturn?"

"I believe that her consciousness has not awakened." Panic and dismay rapidly filled her. Her precious child might never regain consciousness, and as a bonus she'd be stuck here with Accra alone, forever.

"I don't really care," Accra said, "But I'd appreciate not having disdain projected at me for all eternity."

"I can't help it. Maybe if you hadn't killed my family."

Anger, helplessness, despair, rage – and to her own shock, hatred. She projected all these onto the plane, completely out of her control, as she remembered how Venus had been forced to stab Uranus and Neptune, how they had disappeared into that awful sword, how they were gone, gone, and the hatred rose to overtake everything else until it became a sharp spike that stabbed at Accra's mind until, to Accra's own surprise, it hurt.

"I will speak to you again when you can feel anything other than hatred for me."

Accra's consciousness retreated. Setsuna tried to follow. She quickly lost the trail entirely and even when she searched the plane for her she could find nothing.

Could being stuck alone forever with only her own thoughts be worse than being stuck here with an enemy she abhorred?

"Accra. Accra?"

Dread filled her as she realized that the answer was yes.

* * *

A/N: To everyone who read _Counterweights_, thank you! I hope you find the sequel even more entertaining/engrossing. To those who have not read _Counterweights_, I recommend reading it first, or the characters here may seem OOC…plus the story will make no sense.

Also, please note that this fic has no regular update schedule, i.e. I'll post a new chapter whenever I feel like it.


	2. To Live Again

**CHAPTER II – To Live Again**

_Thousands of years ago_

Her heels clacked against the marble floor of the innermost sanctuary of the rust-colored temple. Each footstep overlapped as the still air held the sound for longer than natural, until a percussive din filled the sanctuary, only to die away when she reached the glass orb held atop the pedestal at the centre of the room.

She clapped her hands twice and mist filled the orb. She placed her hands on the orb and slid her fingers along it, until something caught on her fingernail. A misty strand slipped out and turned into a silver ribbon. Carefully she peered at the ribbon as she pulled it forth, a pile starting to gather at her feet.

When she finally pulled the last of the strand free, the whole ribbon solidified from a quicksilver texture to a silk-like material. She traced the silk path with the pads of her fingers and paused when she met hard bumps of rough texture.

She had found a few instances of it, over the years, but had thought nothing of it, until she discovered in the ancient tomes held in the sanctuary's massive library that it was not to be so. The ribbons pulled from the orb were to be smooth and of consistent color, not interrupted with a slightly darker thread that seemed to be, of all things, sewn on.

Something was not quite right with the timestream.

She closed her eyes and murmured a few words, an enchantment that slid her into the stream. She caught onto the edge of a cycle and immersed herself into the past and there she found the aberration. She felt a spark of life go out –

And then that same spark returned.

She opened her eyes and let go of the ribbon. It turned to quicksilver once again and slithered back into the orb. A few moments later it had turned to mist, and the orb cleared again. She stepped back, still lost in the sensation of that miracle she had not thought possible.

People brought back to life.

Not as zombies, nor as vampires, nor as ghosts, nor as spirits. Not within the cycles of reincarnation. People brought back to life within their own times.

Resurrection.

She seized on the concept and cautiously let the hope within her grow. If someone in history could do it, she could find a way. She stood and strode toward the library. Her books must hold the answer, somewhere, though surely it would take a while to find it. No matter.

Time was all she had.

* * *

_Several months ago_

What the police could salvage from the wreckages of Minako's houses and apartments they returned to her parents, who in turn gave a few mementos to her friends: jewelry, especially, and clothes and shoes, but also scraps of sheet music, and her collection of Sailor Senshi figurines, and a bedazzled microphone she used only for the most special occasions that Usagi promptly placed on the house's mantle after sending it out to be fitted onto a stand.

Only a few weeks after that did her parents turn over a hard drive to Ami, after the police had tried and failed to recover the contents. A few days of later and Ami had restored at least a few of the files, a fortunate turn of events, as Minako had entrusted to Ami the task to wipe her hard drive in the event of her death.

"Even I would be embarrassed if my parents saw how much porn I've downloaded," Minako said.

With that in mind, Ami set about deleting file after file, after, of course, checking to see if anything would be a good fit for her own collection. She had just about finished when a strangely named folder caught her eye.

Taxes.

As if Minako did her own taxes. An empire like Minako's required an army of accountants. Inside the folder she found a document titled INVESTIGATION METHODS.

_PROVEN_, she had written, _TO BE 100% EFFECTIVE. DETECTIVE V'S FOOLPROOF METHODS TO SOLVING A CASE._

_Method 1: Follow the money._

_Method 2: Look into strange behavior._

_Method 3: Ask Artemis if he's sensed anything weird._

_Practical Application. Case 1: The Case of the Missing Aviator Sunglasses._

Minako had spent months chasing down a pair of Ray-Bans that someone had stolen from her. She could have easily bought a new pair, but –

"It's the principle of the thing," she had said, and somehow managed to apprehend the thief.

Ami scrolled through the document, eyebrows raised as she read of a few cases that the news reported as having been 'mysteriously solved'. Where Minako found such spare time she'd never know. The last case she had been investigating before the war had started had been _Case 25: The Case of the Magical Books_.

_They're called _TheBooks of Resurrection_. I thought they were a myth, that the records of resurrection throughout history were either frauds and hoaxes, or some kind of Sailor Senshi-related magic. But when I went to London earlier this year, I learned differently._

_As I wandered the city in a nocturnal outing, I stumbled upon a mystery. I found a woman's corpse in an alley, just starting to show signs of rigor mortis. The corpse had three arms, two heads, and a large hole through the chest. I contacted the authorities and, knowing they would bury this paranormal event, borrowed their forensics report to further my own investigation. The DNA matched none on file, but a parish priest, Reverend Kent of the Exeter diocese, appeared to be a close relation. _

_The missing persons reports yielded no description matching the victim. I tracked Reverend Kent down and observed his movements. His schedule seemed mostly normal, except he spent excessive time at home in his study, like a theologian more than a parish priest. When I searched his study I found the usual catechisms, bibles, and exegetical texts. Only when I searched under the floorboards did I find the books he had been studying so intently, three slim volumes of _The Book of Resurrection. _The first volume,_ Materials, _the second volume_, Preparedness, _the third volume_, Methods.

_The second volume is inoffensive, mostly means and exhortations to centre oneself and firmly grasp hold of one's soul and its place in the world. The third volume details the process of bringing a person back to life, the expected results, and what steps to take if something were to go wrong. _

_The first volume, however. I fear someone may stumble onto this document, and I will therefore not transcribe the materials required for the spell._

_I confiscated the books and searched parish records for relatives of Reverend Kent. I discovered that his maternal grandmother, a Mrs. Huntington, had died at age 67. Her will included a significant sum of money for her favorite grandson who had, according to obituaries, been left devastated by his Mamaw's death._

_The story fell into place. The Reverend Kent, now grown and with the _Books_ in his possession, had tried to revive his beloved grandmother, and had instead revived a monster. How he had killed her, or if he was even the one who had, remained a mystery._

_I now search for other reports of strange deaths, but police departments are reticent on these types of matters. I have entrusted the books to my friend, L, and have charged him with continuing the investigation. There seems to be no immediate threat and, for now, I must focus my attentions on Case 24: The Case of the Collapsed Warehouse. But I will continue to keep tabs on this, and I will have to return to this case at a later time._

Well, then.

Ami committed the case to memory and proceeded to wipe the hard drive clean and smash it into bits with a hammer before dropping the pieces into a vat of acid. She found Artemis in the living room and dragged him downstairs to her lab, where they could speak privately.

"Artemis," she said, fixing him with a stern look, "Case 25. The Books of Resurrection."

"Ah." Artemis grinned sheepishly. "That."

"Yes, that. When was Minako planning to tell us about this?" She tried not to be angry at her deceased friend, but, honestly.

"After the High Priest and Followers were dealt with," he said. "But then Hamilton and Accra appeared…"

What mattered now, Ami and Artemis agreed, was to continue the investigation. They tried to track down Minako's friend 'L', also known as Lyall Gardner, a private investigator, to his flat in London, but found only his roommate, who related to them how shocked Lyall had been when he found out his favorite superheroine, Sailor V, and his childhood friend, Aino Minako, were one and the same.

"He didn't talk at all for a week after she died," he said. "Then he just…left. I have no idea where he went. As far as I can tell, the only thing he took was a backpack."

A backpack with three books, they guessed. They found no trace of Lyall anywhere in England and when they returned to Japan, they were a little disheartened, but mostly they were worried.

Follow the money.

Ami finally found trace of Lyall Gardner again, after a few nights spent running searches in all Japanese banking institutions for the various alibis he was known to use. Ami broke into his records and found that any money that came in flowed steadily towards his own non-profit religious institution, the Church of the Senshi, and organization she already found suspicious.

She laid the clues out before Artemis and Luna, who she had drafted into the investigation.

Clue 1: Someone who knew them well had founded this Church.

Clue 2: Lyall, who had the Books of Resurrection, was funding this Church.

Clue 3: Minako had not wanted to describe the materials required for the resurrection spell.

Clue 4: There were four dead Senshi.

Conclusion: Whoever had founded the Church would try to bring the dead Senshi back to life using a rather horrible spell found in the Books of Resurrection.

But just who had founded it?

It was around this time that Ami learned she ought to pay more attention to her acquaintances. She suddenly noticed that one of the regular visitors to their Meguro house had not shown her face for two months now.

"Rei-chan," she asked, "Whatever happened to Endo-san?"

"Shizuka?" Rei looked up from the magazine she had been idly flipping through. "She said she was going to be training in the mountains for a couple of months."

* * *

_Now_

Following her visit to the Church of the Senshi's temple, Ami convened a secret meeting with Rei, Artemis, and Luna, calling them down to her lab in the dead of night.

"We have to find Endo-san." With some nefarious villain after Rei, they had to stop Shizuka immediately, before they were swept up in fighting the new enemy. She relayed the whole story to Rei, who looked angry more than anything. She and the cats had perched themselves on the tables, next to the Erlenmeyer flasks and Bunsen burners.

"No way would Shizuka do something like that," Rei said. Ami, Artemis and Luna exchanged worried glances. Rei scowled. "A hunch isn't evidence."

"Why don't you trust my hunches?" Ami asked. "We always follow yours."

"Because I'm psychic!"

"I have an IQ of 300," Ami replied. "I am much more likely to be correct."

"Girls," Luna scolded, and by force of habit Rei and Ami backed down from their argument. "Either one of you may be right. That's why we have to find Shizuka. We have to at least ask her."

Rei buried her head in her hands. "It can't be Shizuka," she said. First, Watanabe and his High Priest craziness, then, Shizuka and her sketchy Church. "Because then the common factor is _me_."

"Well, of course," Ami said, despite Luna and Artemis frantically shaking their heads. "Your intensity draws similarly intense people. Like fire feeding fire, the other party bursts into an inferno of mental instability."

Rei raised her head. "_Inferno of mental instability?_ Are you suggesting that I literally drive people insane?"

"The evidence strongly supports this hypothesis."

Rei's fist cracked against Ami's jaw. Ami retaliated quickly, her fist shooting forward and splitting open Rei's lower lip, drops of blood staining the tile floor. She followed up with a jab to Rei's jugular that left her gasping for air, but Rei, not one to let something like lack of oxygen stop her, lunged forward and tackled Ami to the ground, where they wrestled for control, Rei's somewhat more muscular form helping her keep Ami pinned, though Ami had no qualms about shots to the eyes and punches to the nose. Rei finally gave in and defended her face. Ami took the opportunity to shove her off and the pair rolled on the floor, beakers crashing to the floor as they knocked against tables and bookcases, until they were forcibly pulled apart. They struggled against their captors, but Mamoru and Ryo held fast, barely.

"_What_ is going on with you two?" Mamoru demanded.

Rei kissed her teeth and shook him off before liberating Ami from Ryo's grip.

"Nothing," she spit back. "Ami-chan, I'm sorry," she added, her voice softening. She gazed at the shattered glass littering the floor, and reached for the dustpan in the equipment closet, but a stray glance at Mamoru in his pajamas had her wondering about how loud they must have been for him and Ryo to hear them from all the way upstairs. And if those two had heard them, then… "Mamoru-san, where the hell is Usagi?"

Mamoru cringed. "I thought she was down here."

"Damn it, Chiba!" She managed to restrain herself from clocking him by focusing on her more important errand. She ran upstairs, grabbed her keys, and was on her way out, Mamoru and Ami following her, when her phone began to buzz.

FROM: YUUICHIROU

I FOUND USAGI AT THE PLAZA. ARE YOU GOING TO COME PICK HER UP?

* * *

Usagi knew she was edging close to dangerous desperation, but she had to make it work, this time. She just had to. She'd bring them back to life. She would succeed. She must succeed. She thought of how close Rei had come to being encapsulated in that gel, thought of how she hadn't been able to do anything at all. Rei had had to protect herself, and she did –

But who knew if she'd be able to every time? What if the enemy sent stronger people after her, multiple people? She knew she had the magical power to protect her against a major enemy, but it was against the less powerful villains that she so often failed. Venus, with her quick mind and quicker feet, and Jupiter, with her strength and protectiveness, would be perfect for the job.

Not that there weren't so many other reasons to want them, as well as Uranus and Neptune, to return to life.

This time, it would work. She'd worked hard, over the past few months, to learn those two skills that had eluded her all her life: how to stay still, and concentrate. She had the focus, and she most certainly had the will. If she had to die to bring them back, she'd do it.

She kneeled on the ground before the marble blocks at the Hikawa Plaza.

After he and Rei broke up, Yuuichirou decided to return to the Hikawa Jinja to continue his long-abandoned training for the priesthood. He'd given up most of his worldly wealth, keeping just enough to fund the shrine's operations, and continued to prove that despite his innate goofiness he was truly a reliable man. He checked the adjoining plaza every evening before going to bed and was rather surprised, that night, to find Usagi passed out in front of the marble blocks. He shot off a text to Rei, wrapped Usagi in a blanket, and waited.

* * *

"What am I going to do with you?"

When Usagi opened her eyes she saw the moon and the stars and felt the cool breeze and breathed in that scent of lavender and smoke that heralded Rei. She tilted her head further back and found her lover's eyes.

"Rei-chan," she said. She braced herself for the smack to the forehead that she promptly received.

"Usagi! What the hell were you thinking?"

"Obviously, I wasn't." She closed her eyes and laid her head back. She felt the soft material of cotton pajama pants against her cheeks. Poor Rei. She hadn't meant to bother anyone with her latest attempt to revive the others – mostly because she thought she would finally succeed.

"Why the plaza?" Rei asked.

"I thought if I made it more ceremonial, it would work better."

Silence stretched out between them. Usagi had nearly fallen asleep when Rei bodily lifted her to her feet. She turned her back to her.

"Get on."

With a grin Usagi clambered onto Rei's back and tightened her legs against her ribs. Rei sighed and hooked her arms under her knees, and the pair began their descent towards street level. The hundreds of white steps on the stairs before them seemed gray under the night's darkness.

"It wasn't a bad idea," Rei said. "I mean, the nearly-killing yourself thing was. The ceremonial part wasn't."

"Thanks," Usagi said, surprised to be getting any sort of compliment from Rei about her latest endeavor.

"But, I'm going to kill Mamoru," Rei said, her voice light in an attempt at casualness, only to come out strained against the silence around them.

"Rei – "

"I mean it. He's as good as dead next time I see him."

"Rei-chan!" Usagi smacked her back and clambered off, grabbing her shoulders and spinning her so they were face-to-face. "It isn't his fault. I did this because I thought I could handle it. I'm responsible for my own decisions."

"But you make _bad _decisions," Rei said. At Usagi's frown she hurried to expand: "And that's okay, because these types of self-sacrificial actions are just what's expected of you. But that's why we're around. Me, and him. To stop you from doing this."

Usagi smiled and put her hands up to Rei's, slowly drawing them forward until their fingers were twined together.

"I get it. But neither of you can stop me from doing this. It's not his fault. And it's not yours, either."

"It is my fault," Rei insisted, pulling her hands free of the hold. "Because I decided to trust him and clearly that was a mistake." She nodded. "It's decided. You're sleeping with me every night."

Usagi's smile dropped. "I don't think he'd agree to that. And neither would I."

Rei stared at her feet and critically eyed the debris gathered on the step.

"I don't care. He's not taking care of you. He's not watching out for you. He's not doing his job. If he doesn't want you, then I'll take you." She mumbled the last part and blushed so brightly that even in the darkness Usagi could see the streak of red clearly across her cheeks. Usagi sighed and caressed her cheek, raising her face until they were once again making eye contact.

"I thought you were fine with this."

Rei scowled and broke away.

"Why the hell would you think that I'm actually fine with this?"

"Because you said so!" Usagi grimaced. "Come on. I'm not a psychic like you. I need to be able to take you at your word."

"Fine. Here's the truth: I want you to be mine. All mine." She dropped her voice to a whisper, dropped her gaze to the ground once again. "Please be mine."

"Rei…" Usagi looked to the sky and stared at the bright moon above them, wishing Queen Serenity would magically appear so she could ask for advice. She'd tried asking her actual, current mother for her thoughts on the situation, once, and Ikuko had replied with an awkward smile and an 'I'll love you no matter what'.

"Why didn't you say so in the first place?" Usagi finally asked.

"I didn't want to say so because I thought you'd choose him."

Her voice was mostly firm, but it was impossible to miss the break at the end and the tear drops staining the steps a darker gray. Usagi hurriedly gathered her in her arms and though this was a very unusual position for her managed to more or less comfortingly rub her back until the shaking had subsided.

"So would you?" Rei asked.

She'd never had to before. Rei had withdrawn rather than force her to make a decision the first time. Then she'd decided to be accommodating. Now, if it came down to it, between Mamoru and Rei...

"I don't know."

Rei pulled away.

"Bullshit!" Now that she thought about it, Usagi had always been like this. "This is just like back in the day, when you let Seiya believe you might feel something for her because you were lonely."

"No, that's not true!" It was little true. "I was young," she amended. "I didn't realize…"

"And then you jerked me along for _years_." Partly her fault, of course, for being dishonest, but mostly Usagi's fault, Usagi who had effortlessly broken her heart over and over again, without even noticing. "You know why you never _realize_ that people love you? It's because you've got a selfish heart."

"…Eh?"

Rei nodded. "You pretend not to notice, so you can bask in people's attention without feeling bad about it. How could I have expected anything else from someone whose sole ability is latching onto others who work hard so you don't have to?"

"What?" Usagi looked stricken, for a moment, before she grabbed onto Rei's shoulders and shook her vigorously. "Hey. This isn't you. Snap out of it."

"No!" She pushed her away. "It's the truth. I know you'd pick Mamoru over me, because he spoils you. I know he's the one who suggested 'exploring other options' to you. You think he'll keep it up forever? I finally figured out why you're so afraid that you're going to end up alone. Someday everyone around you will realize you're a useless emotional vampire, just like I have."

Rei slapped her hands over her mouth, hardly able to believe that she'd just spewed such words. So shocked was she that she was slow to react when Usagi backed down the stairs, turned, and ran. She followed a minute later, leaping into her car and tearing down the streets, searching for her before returning to the house, where she ran up the stairs to the bedrooms and tried to open Usagi's door, only to find it locked. She pounded at the door with both fists, over and over again, until Ami, Ryo, and Mamoru stumbled into the hallway, their eyes red from being suddenly awoken.

"Usagi!" she yelled over and over again, mostly hoping to drown out the soft sobs she heard from inside the room. "Come on! I'm sorry! I didn't mean any of it!" Maybe she'd be able to climb in through the window. They had a ladder somewhere in the house, she hoped. Before she could move to execute her plan, Ami grasped her arm.

"What did you do?" And her tone, full of concern but judgment-free, made tears suddenly spill from Rei's eyes. "Come on."

* * *

"I know what the problem is."

Ami had long suspected what the problem was, as soon as her arguments with Rei had turned nasty, and especially earlier tonight, when they had finally come to blows. Now, with Rei sitting on her bed, seething and muttering the words 'I'm such a fucking idiot' repeatedly, Ami obtained the last missing bit of information she needed to confirm her theory, after having drawn out the details of her fight with Usagi.

"I know what the problem is," Ami said, "And I know what the solution is." Before Rei could demand to know what it was, Ami held up a staying hand. "But, I don't know how to get to that solution."

The problem, she said, was that Sailor Mars and Sailor Mercury were missing.

"What?"

"Honestly," Ami said, "This probably falls more into your domain than mine. Think about it. Mars and Mercury have been a part of us since we were fourteen. No, that was just when Luna woke our powers. Mars and Mercury have always been a part of us."

Rei crossed her arms and shot her an annoyed look.

"So?" Rei shook her head. "When I lost my powers, I was upset, of course, but I'd never let it drive me so far as punching you in the face and saying those kinds of things to Usagi."

Ami raised an eyebrow. "It's different, this time. It's not just our powers that have left us." She drummed her fingers against the tabletop. "Perhaps I should put it differently. Our souls have been destabilized."

To Ami her own words sounded rather unscientific, but her idea was the only one that fit all the facts. Neither she nor Rei would act so wildly out of character without something harming the core of their selves. Not only were they missing part of themselves, but their souls were degrading, she suspected, though she knew better than to say so when she could not even convince Rei of her basic theory.

She tried another tactic in response to Rei's skeptical expression.

"What other explanation could there be? Maybe you got that angry all on your lonesome – but both you and I refuse to accept that. Maybe it's PTSD – but both you and I have a hard time grasping the idea that you'd hurt her like that even then. Right?"

Rei nodded miserably.

"Then," Rei said, "We have to find a way to bring Mars and Mercury back."

They both thought briefly to the Books of Resurrection. If a life could be brought back, surely part of a soul could be –

But no. Whatever materials the Books used would be abhorrent, mostly likely some kind of blood or human sacrifice.

"Maybe we can at least find a clue in the Books," Ami said. "We don't have to copy the spell exactly. Surely we could modify it to be a little less drastic."

"You and I modify an ancient, dangerous spell?" Ami nodded. Rei smiled. "I like our odds."

* * *

She cancelled all of her appearances and appointments and had taken to camping on top of the building opposite the Church. Armed with a sleeping bag, a pair of binoculars, a stack of ofuda and a gun, Rei felt more or less prepared for everything. She lay on her stomach, elbows right at the edge of the building, binoculars up, watching as people entered and exited the building. She'd been here a week and had seen no sign of Shizuka or Lyall or any especially suspicious activity. She glanced at her watch, set the binoculars aside, and pulled away from the edge. Ami or Yuuichirou would show up soon, with food, and spend yet another half-hour trying to convince her to go talk to Usagi, as if she could ever face her again after tearing her down so completely. It wasn't as if Usagi had come to try to talk to her, either, and Rei accepted this as a sign.

She heard footsteps behind her and rolled her eyes when she recognized the aura.

"If you're going to beat the shit out of me, you'll have to take over watch duty," she said.

Mamoru swept away the pebbles next to her and set down an elaborate bento.

"I made it myself," he said, a note of pride in his voice. "Well, I did borrow one of Makoto's recipes to help."

What an excellent guilt-tripper. Rei pulled the box toward her and shoveled the food into her mouth as he spoke.

"You ought to go see her. She misses you." He sat down next to Rei. He'd clearly come straight from the Semisphere warehouse, his lab coat and wingtips clashing nicely with the messy hair of a frustrated scientist. "Ami explained it to us."

"So how come she hasn't come see me?" she asked.

"You did say some harsh things to her," he said. "Even if you had a reason, don't you think you should be the one apologizing?"

"Of course," Rei said. "What about you? You should be pissed at me."

"I've been brainwashed by the enemy several times. I even tried to kill her." He shrugged. "It's not the same, but I imagine the feeling is at least a little similar."

He was so infuriating. Why was he so understanding?

"And I've said some stupid things to her," he added. "Although, maybe not as stupid as what you said. Ami didn't tell me any details."

He left this statement in the air, a prompt that could be ignored if Rei wished. In her capacity as Usagi's BFF she had heard about all of his past stupid statements and actions. It was only fair, she decided, if he knew of at least some of her idiocy.

"I said she's going to be alone because she's a useless emotional vampire."

She grinned as her head snapped back from the impact of his fist against her nose. The back of her head smacked the roof and she winced as she tasted copper. She stayed still, for a moment, waited for Mamoru to reach over and extend a hand to help her up.

"You've been training," she said.

"It took me an embarrassingly long time to realize I'm one of only two people on this planet left with superpowers," he commented. His attention wandered when he caught a familiar figure in his periphery vision. He moved toward the edge of the building and squinted. "Say, Rei-san…isn't that Shizuka?"

Rei scrambled for her binoculars. Her jaw dropped when she saw the woman, outfitted in hakama and gi, enter the church.

"Shit!"

Together they raced down the fire escape and sprinted toward the building. They managed to slide in just before the front doors slammed shut and locked. They chased after Shizuka, only to be repelled by a forcefield a metre before they reached her.

"Rei-sama!" Shizuka cried out, turning around at the sound of the impact.

"What are you doing?" Rei demanded, slamming her fist against the forcefield, uselessly. Mamoru, now Tuxedo Mask, proved equally unable to break through.

"I'm going to help you," Shizuka said. "I'm going to bring back Jupiter and Venus." She nodded to herself. "And if it works, Uranus and Neptune are next."

"No. No, no. Shizuka! They're dead, they're gone! It was their fated time."

Shizuka frowned and stepped forward, placing her palm on the forcefield. Rei mimicked her, and though their hands appeared to be touching, the forcefield prevented any actual contact. "No, Rei-sama. A Senshi's fate is to never die." She stepped back. "You should know this better than anyone."

"Shizuka!" Rei yelled, as the double-doors before them opened, revealing an extravagantly spacious domed ceiling, ancient letters of some type inscribed on the arches, covering a large rotunda with a white, broken marble floor on which hundreds of acolytes, all dressed in white robes, kneeled. Dozens more acolytes, half of them in green robes, the other half in orange, occupied the little alcoves that ran along the wall. Each of these acolytes carried a piece of black chalk in one hand, a knife in the other.

Shizuka moved to the centre of the room.

"Chosen ones," she called out, "Step forward."

Those in the alcoves converged to the centre, surrounding Shizuka. With the black chalk they each drew a circle around their feet. Shizuka did the same, and another – Lyall Gardner! – drew black lines to connect all the other circles to Shizuka's. On the podium in front of her he laid a book flat and Rei did not need to see more than this to know Shizuka was about to do something unacceptable. She drew her gun and fired. The forcefield destroyed the bullet.

"Shizuka!" she cried out again. Sailor Moon and Ami had finally arrived, but not even Sailor Moon's attacks managed to break through.

"Blood," Shizuka intoned, "Ten pints per person."

Two men on either side of her slit their major arteries, collapsing to the ground, blood pumping outwards from their cuts, others gathering around them to collect the blood into jars. Once full they set the jars in two more circles they had drawn on the floor.

"A guide," she continued, "To show them the way." She reached forward and drew two circles in front of her, connecting them to hers with straight lines. She sat down, cross-legged, closed her eyes, and repeated the kuji-in, over and over again, centering herself, _rin pyo tou sha kai jin retsu zai sen_…

"And life," she finally whispered, "Equivalent to those lost."

The people clad in green and orange now slit their throats, blood spilling at their feet, knives clattering to the grounds as their lives were extinguished. Wind roared forth. Lightning and thunder crashed down, pieces of the ceiling crumbling to the floor. A bright light filled the hall –

* * *

Boredom.

What was it? How did it happen?

She remembered a philosopher's words on the subject. He had said something like: A restless mind is never bored. No, that wasn't it. Maybe it was more like: Only boring people are bored. She could go to her gates, find the time he had lived in, and see him write or speak the exact quote. If only she could contact the Gates of Time.

"Hotaru," she called out, and still she received no answer. She hesitated, then tried to call for another: "Accra".

She wanted to seek neither her company nor conversation with her and the loneliness she felt would not have driven her to such actions. But though Setsuna had often been alone, she'd never faced such an unending well of boredom.

"Lady Accra. I am the Guardian of Time. I am sure you have many questions to ask me." Reluctantly, she added: "And I really have nothing better to do than to answer them."

She tried to push forward the resignation and sincerity and hide the hatred and anger away. She did not have the mental energy to keep up such rage-oriented emotions for long, anyway. She felt them slip away onto the plane, slip away until they were no longer hers, until they were emotions hanging in the ether. Maybe Buddhists had access to this plane, she thought, as she watched ANGER and HATRED pass by like clouds on a light breeze.

"I do have many questions for you."

A wave of appreciation and smugness immediately responded to the jolt of joy Setsuna felt at finally hearing another voice again.

"I still think you're despicable."

"You think it," Accra replied, "But you don't really care to feel it. I find this sufficient."

Minds, it turned out, could sigh. Setsuna did so, and quickly learned that minds could also smirk.

"Gloating is unbecoming of a lady," Setsuna said. "What are your questions?"

Accra's sudden iron focus surprised Setsuna as she sharply asked: "Can you see all of time?"

"The past is clear and singular, until I approach the beginning of the universe. The present is a little fuzzier. I see a number of possibilities for the immediate future, and too many to count for the far future." She considered the wisdom of divulging this to an enemy, but there was no lying with shared consciousness. "What I see is more like probabilities. The most probable outcomes are clear. The least probable ones are less so."

"Can you show me something from the past?"

"It is more difficult for me to look into time in this state." The annoyance seeped through and caught Accra's attention. Setsuna responded before she could ask. "I cannot see anything while stuck in this time loop."

"Then drop this barrier."

"The barrier is not mine. It is Saturn's. Besides," she added, "We must keep you in here. Unless you can guarantee you will no longer harm the inhabitants of this planet."

"I cannot provide such a guarantee. However…"

Setsuna felt intense thought from Accra. She waited silently, her own curiosity piqued.

Finally, Accra said: "What if we were to exit this sphere non-corporeally?" Setsuna's wave of confusion prompted Accra to elaborate. "Our bodies are trapped in this sphere. Our souls have found their way to this…place. I feel no barrier here. You, with powers over time and space, could perhaps use your latter power to move our souls to the Earth's spirit realm. Without our bodies, I doubt we will be able to affect the Earth physically, but we ought to at least be able to see."

"So, you would like to be a ghost, more or less." As ludicrous as it sounded, she had no better ideas. "However, how would we return to this place? I am not entirely certain what this place is."

"I am inclined to believe this is a place where souls go on 'stand-by', to put it crudely," Accra said. "And I have faith that you will be able to guide us back. Can you not sense Saturn's soul?"

"Of course," Setsuna said, "But I have no faith in my ability to sense her soul from a different spiritual plane."

"Then, simply knot your magic together."

"…_What?_"

Setsuna thought Accra's delight at her astonishment to be most offputting.

"Do not forget that I have conquered galaxies! You are not the first Sailor Senshi I've encountered." Which meant that she had killed them, or brainwashed them, and Setsuna could not hide her disgust, but it seemed not to bother Accra this time, eager to continue her explanation. "And I have learned something interesting. This is not the only way to conceptualize your magic, but it is the most practical. Imagine that your Sailor Senshi powers are a sphere. You all share almost exactly the same Senshi core. The surface is coated with glue. This glue is more or less suited to having different powers stick to it. The Sailor Pluto glue, for example, is much more suited for powers over space and time than, say, water."

Laughable, impossible, nonsensical. Accra responded to the wave of skepticism with amusement.

"But glue is glue, which means you could borrow another's power, temporarily, if they are not in use. Of course, eventually, the power will draw back to its owner. Borrow some of Saturn's powers. She'll call them back soon enough, and we'll find our way back to this plane."

There was only one way to prove her wrong. Setsuna focused on Hotaru's magical signature, looked for the hallmark of Silence Glaive Surprise, pulled it forth and into herself, and felt it…

Stick.

Accra laughed at the rush of unease that filled her. "I imagine it must be a disturbing sensation. Now, would you move our souls?"

The shock of having one of Saturn's attacks at her disposal was quickly supplanted by the fear of their souls getting lost somewhere between this stand-by plane and Earth's.

"I'm a genius," Accra said, with no modesty at all. "My plan will not fail. Therefore, we can go see what's happening out there, or we can stay here for forever. You and I. Alone."

Decision made.

And suddenly their souls hurtled toward Earth and abruptly joined its spectral plane as floating spirits. They continued to share a consciousness, and this time Setsuna delighted at Accra's vague feeling of disgust.

"This is a most unsettling experience," Accra said. She stared at the Semisphere, and at their bodies inside, rapidly aging and de-aging.

Setsuna occupied herself with trying to interact with the night watchman. Her arm passed through his body. He looked as bored as ever. Re-assured that they could have no effect on the physical world, she moved on to the next pressing item. She contacted the Door of Space-Time, glanced through the threads and saw that Hamilton had been killed. She relayed this information to Accra, whose triumphant smile could not hide the strange combination of relief and remorse she felt at this news.

Setsuna had more important matters to deal with than a galactic conquerors complicated emotions. She had to find the girls and see how they were doing. She moved forward, Accra following behind her, a sense of trepidation surrounding her.

"Do not fear," Setsuna said. This would have worked better had Setsuna not been emanating uncertainty. Together they floated towards the one active Senshi aura they felt. They passed through the doors of a large church and spotted Sailor Moon, Tuxedo Mask, Ami and Rei railing against a forcefield. On the other side of the forcefield, blood and bodies, lightning and thunder and destruction, and suddenly a bright light –

* * *

A/N: I meant to write something less convoluted than _Counterweights_, but Accra and Setsuna happened.

Thank you **thundercrash **and **x-kali-x**!


	3. Appraisal

**CHAPTER III – Appraisal**

_Thousands of years ago_

Her hand trembled as she raised the lantern to better illuminate the title on the spine of the book set on the highest shelf in this dark section of the library. The title was in an old language, a dead language long fallen into disuse, but she knew all of them, had learned all of them from the books in this library, and her heart thrummed against her chest when she realized she had found what she was looking for. She set the lantern down and pulled the book from the shelf, ignoring the cloud of dust that arose when she did so. Housekeeping could wait. She strode back to the centre table and opened the book in the middle.

_I cannot overstate the dangers of attempting this ritual. After years of training in the spiritual arts, I thought myself prepared, but the first time I created a path back to life I nearly lost my own soul. The second time was the last time I did it. Hitherto I had spent hours daily in deep meditation, and felt sure of my abilities to bring back the extinguished soul, and when I did so my life was not imperiled. Still I felt I had lost something of myself, and_ –

Here she stopped reading. She cared not at all if she lost something of herself. She did not even care if she lost her own soul. She flipped to the first page and began to read in earnest. She read everything, the author's history, the story of the discovery of the ritual, the ritual itself, the warnings, the cautions – no need, after all, to take unnecessary risks – and his short discussion at the end about the results.

And when she had read the book through several times and had thoroughly memorized the ritual, she fetched the required materials and set up the ritual stage: three circles drawn in chalk with herself in the centre one, the one to her right with a jar full of blood, the one to her left occupied by a fresh corpse. She set the book on a small stand before her, just in case.

She closed her eyes and focused on the person she wanted to return to life, and as she muttered the words she ignored the noise that rose around her, a great wind and loud boom, until the ritual was completed and she opened her eyes and looked to her right to see…

A monster.

An imitation of a human. The gray undertone to the skin color, the whites of the eyes with neither pupils nor irises, the huge almond-shaped gash in the stomach that bled orange.

"You're not…her…" she said. This thing was horrifying to look at, horrifying to contemplate, she had to eliminate it immediately. She raised her hand, palm outstretched.

"I am not her," the monster said, "But I know everything about her. I could be her, if I wanted to, but she was a twisted one. Her one true wish in life was to see the inside of a still-living body."

She scrambled backward, keeping her hand aimed at the monster, and began to recite an incantation.

"Your magic cannot stop me." Claws split open the monster's fingers and replaced them entirely as the useless appendages dropped to the ground. With both hands raised the monster made to slash her open. She sucked her stomach in and avoided the death blow, just barely.

"Flagrante," she intoned, and the monster burst into flames from the inside, and soon the fire had consumed the monster entirely, and all that was left were ashes that she sent spiraling away into the air with a wave of her hand.

* * *

_Present day_

Ami had managed to replicate the dark blue gel. Mixed with distilled water it formed an approximation of the substance the attacker had fired at Rei, minus the green beads, whose composition she couldn't yet identify. With her new 3D printer she'd made a blaster for it, a stout barrel with a clear chamber for the substance. The first test, on herself, had resulted in her being stuck to the wall for a day, until it had dissolved. Now for the second test, to see if a Sailor Senshi could break out of it.

"Ready?"

Usagi nodded and raised her hand. "Moon Eternal Power… Make Up!"

In a flash she transformed into Eternal Sailor Moon. She stood against the bare wall, stretching her arms out on either side of her. A moment later the blue gel hurtled toward her. By instinct, she pulled her arm away.

"You're not supposed to dodge," Ami said.

"Sorry!" She stretched her arms out again and squeezed her eyes shut. "Um, hey, Ami-chan… do you think I should apologize?"

"What?" She pulled the trigger and watched the gel trap Sailor Moon's arm against the wall. Sailor Moon pulled forward, struggling to free herself. "Apologize to who? For what?"

"To Rei." Her voice sounded pinched with the strain as she gathered her power and tried again to break free. "For… you know…"

Ami grabbed a clipboard and noted how the gel hardened and cracked as Sailor Moon pulled against it.

"On the one hand," Ami said, "I can understand why you'd want to take her at her word. It's important to grant people agency." She peered at Sailor Moon over her glasses. "On the other hand, you know her better than that. You should have expected it. But," she added, before Sailor Moon could argue, "I'm not sure you can really apologize until you've decided on a course of action."

Exactly what Sailor Moon had hoped not to hear. "This is so frustrating!" With one final push forward she freed her arm, the gel shattering, shards littering the floor below. She clapped her hands together "Yay, I did it!"

Before Ami could collect a sample of the shards, her communicator on the desk behind her lit up, and both she and Sailor Moon scrambled for it when they heard Rei's distressed voice.

"Ami-chan, Usagi, are either of you there? We need help immediately, it's fucking Shizuka after all, damn it!"

* * *

_Six years ago_

Nothing interesting ever happened here.

The mountaintop shrine was her home; the village below it the only place she had ever known. Her father had travelled all over Japan, had worked in shrines in the city and the countryside, far north in the cold and far south in the tropics. Her mother had travelled all over the world, consulting work for the big food producers in the American Midwest and smaller farmers in Europe and Australia.

Whenever she'd complain about how nothing interesting ever happened in their little village, they'd both answer: Nothing interesting ever happened anywhere.

"What about Tokyo?" she replied, thinking of the Sailor Senshi posters she had plastered up on the walls of her room. Interesting things happened in Tokyo, like deadly monsters getting warded off by magical warriors.

Her parents told her: "Tokyo isn't interesting. Tokyo is just dangerous. Be happy here."

And she was. She studied hard and spent time with her friends and helped run fun festivals.

But the difference between happiness and fulfillment was drawn in sharp clarity the day that visitor arrived.

Many people came to the shrine, and many guests stayed for at least a few days, but none of them ever seemed interesting to Shizuka. The guests always visited in search of refuge, or guidance, or inner peace, and always they'd leave only a little better off than before, never truly finding what they were looking for. Every person was the same, so when her father mentioned that they would be hosting a pyromancer, Shizuka had to force herself to feign interest.

"A pyromancer. Like you?"

"Probably better than me," he said, with a rueful smile. "She's sort of famous. Maybe infamous would be the better word?"

That fated day, Shizuka gathered with the other mikos at the top of the steps and watched as the pyromancer gasped for air in her bid to complete the arduous climb by bike. She glared at the priest on his bike a few metres ahead of her with hilariously intense annoyance but even this facial contortion hardly hid her beauty. The girls immediately burst into whispers, wondering if all Tokyo women were so gorgeous. Shizuka expected that their guest would not appreciate the gawking of schoolgirls as a welcome, and as the daughter of the absent host she accomplished her duty of shooing them away. As the pyromancer climbed the steps, Shizuka debated on whether she ought to help settle her in, or leave that to the priest – when she felt a thrill bloom in her heart. The woman had climbed the last step and though she wasn't at all tall, managed to give off a commanding aura, partly thanks to her superior, impervious expression, but mostly due to the power that simply emanated from her.

When her father returned from his trip, Shizuka cornered him and let betrayal color her voice.

"Why didn't you tell me she was so…powerful?"

Her father raised an eyebrow at this word choice, but Shizuka could think of no better way to describe it.

"Why is she here?" She pressed on. "What could someone like her be searching for?"

"You have good senses, Shizuka," he said, "But you still have a long way to go."

He left her with this cryptic statement. After that, Shizuka spent most of her afternoons and evenings observing the woman's habits a little too carefully. She would wake before Shizuka did and go to bed long afterwards. She would spend hours before the fire. She would help the miko with their shrine duties and accomplish them flawlessly. Some inquiries revealed that Hino Rei had been a miko in her youth, that most priests who knew her expected her to continue training in university, only for her to abruptly change paths. The mystery of this surprisingly friendly but still-distant woman deepened.

The sixth day of her visit, Shizuka finally made friends with Rei. She liked to think so, anyway. They had bonded over ruined manga and a vague admiration for the Sailor Senshi. Little did she know! And she suspected it not at all, not even when Sailor Mars suddenly appeared in her bedroom and dragged her to the mountainside to display her Mars Flame Sniper.

All thoughts of Hino Rei disappeared from her mind as she grew focused on Sailor Mars. Mars, who formerly fell low on her list of favorites, shot past Sailor Venus to claim first place in her heart. Seeing an arrow, infinite, glowing, shot up into space, from so close up, had reignited her belief that interesting things existed and sparked in her a fervent desire to see more of the world, to _be _more, and to her that meant a move to Tokyo. She studied hard, and gained scholarships to various Tokyo colleges, but turned them down when she received an offer from that Hino Rei who had come to visit so long ago.

The new job got her to Tokyo, and erased all memories of late nights spent staring down mountain cliffs and thinking how easy it was to just throw away a life. Tokyo was new, Tokyo was exciting, and Tokyo had gotten her closer to Sailor Mars and her comrades. When she lived on that mountain she spent most of her spare time looking up videos of the Sailor Senshi in action. At first, the rare footage, downloaded through peer-to-peer networks; later, streaming video as smart phones proliferated. She often thought of seeing them live in action, and now that she was in Tokyo she found a group of like-minded people – Senshi chasers, they were called – and fulfilled this dream.

She ardently loved Sailor Mars and had always liked Venus but she grew to appreciate the others more and more as she saw them in action. The grace and elegance of Uranus and Neptune, Jupiter's strength, Mercury's intelligence, Pluto and Saturn's competence and confidence, and Sailor Moon who managed, inexplicably, improbably, to stand out among this stellar group.

But she had trained as a priestess, and when she tried to unravel the mystery of Sailor Moon's shining spirit, she noticed the little things. Like how Uranus and Neptune were hopelessly, devotedly in love with each other. Like how Saturn always seemed to be holding back with her attacks, for some reason. Like how Pluto acted with complete trust in the others' abilities. Like how Jupiter would land the hardest blows when defending the others. Like how Mercury took just a second longer to leap into the fray, to figure out how to maximize her friends' strength. Like how Venus drew attention to herself to protect the others. Like how Mars was hopelessly, devotedly in love with Sailor Moon.

She wanted to learn more, but the Senshi chaser groups disbanded, as their battles became more frequent and dangerous. When Venus killed Jupiter, Neptune, and Uranus, she felt personally devastated, but when she saw the news, the revelation of Sailor Mars' secret identity, she realized –

She had hit the jackpot.

The implications of the news cut off her joy when she realized the danger Rei faced. She did not manage to stretch her imagination far enough to realize great danger also faced her, and Hamilton took her by surprise when he kidnapped her and brought her to the roof of the tower. Everything after that happened so quickly, too quickly for her to quite grasp, and before she knew it she was trapped inside a halfway-collapsed building, with Hino Rei/Sailor Mars's blood falling onto her shirt.

She looked up, away from the blood pooling on her, made eye contact with Rei, and then knew she had never understood the Sailor Senshi properly. She had seen them as magical kickass women who fought against bad guys, like sentai fighters in a manga. What she hadn't realized was that the true source of their power was not, really, magic.

Their power came from their earnest, desperate desire to protect humanity. No, not humanity, as a concept, but humans. People. Individually. Right now, Rei was protecting her, specifically, and she would have done the same, for any other person – not because lives were worth saving, in an abstract, philosophical sense, but because every person's life was worth saving. Now she understood the mystery of Sailor Moon's shine. Now she understood the scale of the tragedy Hamilton had caused.

And then the building collapsed.

And afterwards, after the war, as she stared at the memorials to the various fallen Sailor Senshi, she had thought – how terrible.

How terrible that they, who felt every loss so acutely, would have to gracefully handle the loss of their friends and comrades.

How terrible that they had been the ones to kill them.

She had seen them, she had felt how the atmosphere changed whenever Jupiter or Venus or Neptune or Uranus's names were mentioned. She had seen their despair, grief, and anger. And she had overheard the effects of far too many of their erratic mood swings. She helped them, helped keep the press away until they recovered, helped arrange their schedules after that, took down dictation as they worked on the many memorial speeches they were to deliver.

It was not enough. Not enough for them, and not enough for her, either, but she was out of ideas.

She turned to Lyall, who she had through one of her online Senshi fan groups, where they'd had to vigorously defend their claims to be the biggest Sailor Mars and Venus fans, respectively. In him she'd sensed a kindred spirit, and every time they met he'd hint darkly at something that her upbringing would force her to reject out of hand. But in quiet moments, while washing dishes, or running a mindless errand, she'd think about it, and the idea had stopped repulsing her so entirely.

They met again at a library, where he showed her the books.

"There's just one thing," he said, staying her hand as she reached for the first volume. "We'll have to go to great lengths to perform this spell. Are you…would you be willing to kill?"

She frowned. "Of course not."

"Then we might have a problem."

But he let go of her hand anyway, and sipped at his coffee as she skimmed through the books. When she reached the end of the third volume she slammed it shut and smiled.

"There's no problem," she said. "We won't have to kill anyone. We'll just have to get people to kill themselves."

* * *

_Life equivalent to those lost_. What worth a Senshi? How could one life equate to another? Did it mean age, or value? It was difficult to tell, as they were still young, but none of the still-living Sailor Senshi seemed to have aged past 25. Shizuka hazarded that they would have long lifespans, guessed at 1000 years. Besides, they were surely worth about a dozen good people, each.

She started a church. Lyall came through with the money and her friend Nobu was willing to head it up. She weeded her flock until only the true fanatics were left, the ones who could describe the slightly different shades of blue that colored Sailor Moon, Uranus, Venus, Mercury and Neptune's irises, the ones who could rattle off their education and work histories, the ones who knew everything about their families.

She reached out carefully, focusing on those who Jupiter and Venus had rescued, before she switched tactics to focus on the families of those they had rescued, for they were the ones who made sure Jupiter's statues were always covered in flowers and the ones who had insisted on having spotlights shine on Venus's statues day and night. The fathers and mothers, especially, seemed much more willing to do whatever it took to help their heroes. She introduced the idea slowly, casually mentioning it, continuing on the topic if they seemed to take an interest, before finally ask them directly:

"Would you be willing to die if it meant we could bring her back to life?"

And if they recoiled, or even if they seemed at all reluctant, she dropped the topic entirely; but if they responded positively, enthusiastically, she showed them the books.

She introduced them to the rest of the group as the chosen ones, the ones who would save the Earth by bringing back their heroes, she thought they deserved at least that much recognition. She left them in Lyall and Nobu's care while she retreated to the mountains, the second volume of the Books of Resurrection in hand, focus on regaining the spiritual abilities she'd had as a teenager. She sat in front of the fire day and night, keeping in mind the author's admonitions to keep one's soul anchored to this Earth. What good was a guide who got lost on the way? She felt her state become more and more relaxed, until she felt peace within herself. She'd finally been honest, and had admitted her hesitation to herself, but she knew this was the only way, and she knew this was how it had to be.

She returned to the church, called together all the acolytes, and prepared for the ritual. Rei and Mamoru's sudden arrival had surprised her, and Rei's demands that she stop had shocked her, for wasn't it Rei, after all, who had so offhandedly mentioned, that day they visited the memorial plaza, that eternal death and resurrection was the Senshi's cross to bear?

She sat in her circle and began to chant, feeling the ground beneath her, feeling her body present in the present, feeling her soul ready to leap forth and guide two others –

"And life equivalent to those lost." A great wind started up. She blocked out the thunder and sonic booms and instead focused on the ground, on her soul, and on the image of Jupiter and Venus she held clear in her mind.

"I call forth Aino Minako and Kino Makoto!" she cried out, and her soul leapt out and reached towards them and found them – they were here, on Earth! In that sword Sailor Moon carried! – she grabbed hold of them and pulled them into the two jars with the pints of blood. The blood overflowed, shot upwards, and coalesced into vaguely human forms, one like Jupiter, the other like Venus, and she realized she was missing something. Jupiter and Venus were forming before her, but where were Minako and Makoto?

She closed her eyes again, reached upwards, failed to find them, looked around, found their sparks, and tried to pull them back to Earth, but they just wouldn't co-operate. She nudged and cajoled and begged but their souls did not even respond. She sank deeper into their plane, trying to find out why they were stuck there, and she thought maybe they weren't stuck there at all, maybe they wanted to stay there, there was peace here, she didn't have to think about the cult she'd created or about how she'd indirectly murdered or about how interminably boring life was, didn't have to think about anything at all –

* * *

They watched the two glowing lights from Sailor Moon's sword rip away and float towards the two jars of blood. They saw Shizuka's eyes roll back and her body slump over. They watched as the blood shot out of the jars, turning into human forms, flesh sliding over the blood to create skin, hair growing out from the scalp, eyes, nostrils and ears forming, fingers and toes refining, clothes wrapping around their bodies, until they were here again, Venus and Jupiter, back on Earth, except they hadn't quite managed to get their irises or pupils colored in and their mouths were full of canines, long and jagged, meant to tear meat off of bones, and they put their teeth to use, reaching for the nearest acolytes and biting into their shoulder, ripping off an arm, a leg –

"Oh my god." This wasn't objectively the worst scene Setsuna had witnessed, but to see this false Venus and Jupiter, tearing into people, blood spilling from their mouths, traumatized her into stillness. Mamoru and the girls had gone into shock as well, staring at the scene, open-mouthed, until Ami shook her head, raised her gun, and fired at the barrier, again and again, uselessly.

Accra had been just as surprised by the scene, but had recovered far more quickly, caught up now in examining the barrier. She laid her palms flat against it and pushed lightly.

"Impossible," she said. Setsuna turned away from the gore, focusing on Accra's hands making physical contact with the forcefield. "Unless… Someone has cast this barrier across multiple universes." She closed her eyes. "It must be so. This forcefield has the magical marker of the people of Myr." Her eyes snapped open. "Who hardly deserve to be called a people. I crushed them. I eliminated every last Myr in this universe." She pushed harder against the forcefield and muttered something quickly. The barrier shattered and the Sailor Senshi stumbled into the rotunda.

"Why did you help them?" Setsuna asked.

"The Myr are a dishonest and weak race with not a single admirable quality. I will not let the plans of a Myr, even one from another universe, come to fruition. Besides," she added, "I would like to see what your friends do."

* * *

Inexplicably the barrier fell and they quickly stepped forward, Rei and Ami with guns raised.

"Wait!" Before they could fire, Sailor Moon stepped ahead of them, arms outstretched. "Jupiter! Venus!"

To everyone's surprise, Jupiter and Venus stopped their massacre. Those acolytes not paralyzed by shock swiftly moved to escape while the two stared at Sailor Moon. She moved a few steps closer, hesitantly, until she was about a metre away from them, and there she made her entreaty:

"Minako-chan. Mako-chan. Please, don't do this. You don't have to do this. You can a peaceful life, here on Earth."

Not a single whisper or movement from anyone in the room. Everyone watched the scene carefully, Sailor Moon with her hands clasped, standing steadfast before the imitation Venus and Jupiter.

"Do you smell that?" Venus asked.

They could speak? The shock that ran through Sailor Moon right then almost prevented her from hearing Jupiter's next words.

"Yes. A pure heart."

She ducked, right as Venus and Jupiter leapt forward, teeth bared. Ami and Rei raised their guns again and fired, shell after shell clattering against the marble floor as they emptied their rounds, Rei firing at Jupiter and Ami at Venus, by unspoken agreement. They reloaded quickly and fired again and again, aiming for the head, landing every shot, preventing them from tearing into Sailor Moon, for now, but their heads grew back every time, and when they had run out of ammo they exchanged tense glances.

Tuxedo Mask grabbed Ami's blaster from her holster, fired twice, and Venus and Jupiter slammed against the wall, the gel solidifying quickly and holding them in place. They immediately struggled to free themselves, and the substance already showed cracks.

"Sorry I used your gun," Tuxedo Mask said.

"Never mind that. The sword, Sailor Moon!"

She was the only one who could wield it with any strength or accuracy, now, proving too heavy for Ami and Rei and scalding Tuxedo Mask when he gripped the handle. This was a Sailor Senshi's weapon through and through, but her hands trembled as she drew it and her arms shook as she pointed it toward Jupiter.

"It's not them," Rei called out. "Look around you, Sailor Moon! Look at all these dead people! They'd never do that. They're imposters!"

"But…but they were brainwashed by that virus, when they died," she stuttered out.

"That wasn't them, either," Ami said. "They died as soon as the virus hit them." She hesitated, watched the cracks in the gel expand, they'd be free in a few more seconds. "For their sake, we have to believe that. Jupiter didn't kill all those people back then, when she was under Hamilton's control, and they haven't killed anyone now. These are monsters. Nothing more."

Why did they have to look so much like her friends, then? But she stepped forward, closed her eyes, and ran Jupiter, then Venus, through with the sword. The sparks shot out of their chests and settled back into the sword, their white eyeballs turned black, their bodies slumped lifelessly against the wall. She sheathed the sword and reached out to touch Venus's face, jumped back when the two bodies burst into flames, disintegrating into ashes.

"What the – "

She jumped backward again when a piece of ceiling crashed directly beside her.

"We have to get out of here. Now," Ami said. She cleared her throat, and in her most doctor's orders tone of voice let her voice ring across the hall: "Everyone evacuate immediately!"

She kept an eye on those exiting, but the scene of the two bodies disintegrating interested her more. She ran across the hall, coming to a stop beside Sailor Moon, and leaned forward, hoping to catch a glimpse of anything that could explain their spontaneous combustion, but she could only watch for a few seconds before she had to look away from her friends' burning bodies.

"Let's get out of here," she said, looping her arm with Sailor Moon's and pulling her to the centre of the room, where Rei and Tuxedo Mask kneeled next to Shizuka. "Verdict?" she asked.

"She's alive," Tuxedo Mask said, thumb against her wrist, feeling the steady beat of her pulse, "But she seems to be in a coma. Or something."

"Her soul is gone," Rei said, her voice empty of intonation. The third Book of Resurrection, _Methods_, still lay before her. She grabbed it and nodded to Tuxedo Mask, who lifted Shizuka in his arms, stood, and nodded to Ami and Sailor Moon. "Let's go."

With one last glance around the hall they made their escape, just as the ceiling collapsed completely and buried the sordid scene in steel and cement. They stepped outside and were met with blinding camera flashes, the shouting of reporters, the red strobe lights of ambulances, and the barrels of several police officers' firearms.

* * *

The worst part of having their civilian identities known: they couldn't disappear to avoid police questioning.

After a few hours of questioning – and after Rei and Ami very reluctantly surrendered their guns – they released them, promising to keep them updated on their investigation. The police issued an arrest warrant for Lyall Gardner. Ami and Rei both agreed it would be best if they found him first, for though Rei had _Methods_ the other two books, _Materials_ and _Preparedness_, were probably with him.

When they returned home the sun already shone brightly, high in the sky. Mamoru and Usagi greeted them in the living room, the two released earlier when they proved they carried no weapons other than their magical ones, the blaster smuggled back to the house by means of Artemis and Luna.

"Rei," Usagi said, "I'm sorry about Shizuka."

"As am I," Mamoru said, but Rei sensed something else in his voice, and gave him a sharp look.

"What is it?"

"How can I say this…" He turned the television on.

"…Breaking news this hour. Speculation that Sailor Mercury and Sailor Mars lost their powers in the war against Hamilton. Observers note that neither have been seen in their Senshi uniform since then, and both are reported to have used handguns in their most recent battle, our top news story for today. Police continue to investigate yesterday's violent confrontation in a Tokyo church…"

"So," Mamoru said, "People might target you if they think you're defenseless."

"Defenseless! We're – " Rei cut herself off mid-argument. Compared to being a Sailor Senshi…

"Right? So you two can't go anywhere alone," Usagi said.

"But I wanted to go to the HIkawa Jinja," Rei complained. "I need to get a read on this situation. A new enemy, this resurrection stuff…"

"Then I'll go with you."

Rei scowled. "I'll be meditating. You're too distracting."

"Then I'll go," Mamoru offered.

"No! Ami-chan, come with me please." Rei shrugged at Usagi and Mamoru's hesitating looks. "It's better than going by myself, right?"

"Ami-chan doesn't have powers either! I'm going with you."

"No, you're not."

"Yes, I am."

* * *

Accra and Setsuna watched the scene silently.

During the battle and the police questioning, through Ami and Rei's conversation on their way back to the current conversation, Setsuna had sensed from Accra a mixture of amusement and, of all things, boredom.

"A predictable course of events," Accra said. "I do miss Venus and Neptune. At least they surprised me, at times. Now, it seems there is nothing new under the sun."

"You know, one of this planet's poets wrote just that," Setsuna replied. Accra smiled.

"I was not aware, which I believe proves my point." She leaned back and sighed. "The only interesting thing about that fight was the spontaneous combustion of the bodies. I have already seen evil Senshi get stabbed with a sword."

"They were not fighting for your entertainment."

"I wish they had been. If ever I escape from the Sphere, I will turn one of my planets into a gladiatorial world. Anyone who kills or even fights creatively enough will earn a transfer to a more peaceful planet."

"Yet another reason to never release you from the Sphere. Your every action is morally abhorrent."

"Ah, Pluto, surely you peeked into my past while investigating me and Hamilton? Our moralities were forged in very different settings. You must forgive me if I act in a manner you deem unseemly."

"Unseemly! Not treating others' lives as entertainment is simple – " humanity, she almost said, before she realized it wouldn't apply. She frowned at Accra's amusement. "Entertainment value is not an appropriate measure of a person's life. Altruism is the best means for species survival."

"I do not care about species survival," Accra replied. "I care about my survival, and only for as long as there is a purpose to it. Once there is nothing new to see, do, or discover, I might as well die."

"Then go ahead and die," she bit out.

"I still hold out hope." She snapped her fingers. "I have an idea. Show me their worst moments. Show me their most sorrowful moments. If they have suffered worse than I, I may rethink their life value."

"No, you won't. Why try to lie when our consciousness remains linked?" Setsuna shook her head. "Sheer voyeurism. Allow me to share this, then: only two had anything like a stable and supportive family. We count among our group one neglected child, two black sheep, two dead mothers, and two orphans."

"Is that all? I'd hardly characterize their suffering as worse than mine."

"I refuse to further engage in your suffering Olympics."

"What are Olympics?" Setsuna felt Accra's hope rise up. She quashed it quickly.

"Nothing new. A sports competition." Setsuna pinched the bridge of her nose, having just learned that a soul could get headaches. _There is nothing new under the sun_. No, there really wasn't, she thought, as she watched Rei and Usagi's argument escalate and Mamoru and Ami exchange affectionately exasperated glances. There was nothing new, but –

"I'll show you something different," Setsuna said, though she hadn't decided what, yet. The battle against Galaxia? The fight against Queen Beryl? How they had opened their hearts to the Black Moon Clan and Mistress Nine and Queen Nehellenia? "Don't you think they find their own cycles of defeating an enemy, resting for a few months at best, and starting up again a little tiresome? Yet they continue to find value to life. I'll show you their best moments. I'll show you their happiest moments." She pulled at threads from the Time Door…

* * *

A/N: Pretty sure the Door of Space-Time doesn't work that way, oh well…

Why have some of my line breaks disappeared?

Shizuka's flashback references chapters seven (number eight, due to the prologue) and 16 (17) of _Counterweights_.

**blue, x-kali-x**, I think I agree about that scene, I will consider further and might edit. As for how things end up, we'll see... **Mikasa**, thanks! **mercurypower**, just what I wanted to hear, thank you. **ErenJaeger**, grandpa is at a shrine in the countryside and father is helping rebuild the government. I might visit them eventually. **rainbowsailormoon**, thank you! **Skye Valkyrie**, I truly appreciate your review on _Counterweights_ and hope I can live up to it with _Trebuchet_.

**Mikasa**, **Eren**, get back to killing titans…


End file.
